Sporting ethics talk, but money talks louder
The Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund has wedged its way into popular professional sports, but at what cost?
It was only last July when Rory McIlroy claimed that there was “no room in the golf world for LIV Golf”. It was also just around a year ago when Tiger Woods turned down a reported £800m deal to join LIV, but the legend remained steadfast in his loyalty to the tradition of the PGA Tour. The PGA Tour thanked these two faces of the sport by joining those who they believed they could not beat. In reality, LIV Golf was floundering; the league’s ratings were sinking by 24% on a weekly basis this past March and they eventually decided to just stop publicizing their viewership. These are obvious indicators of a prosperous organization that would lead a juggernaut like the PGA Tour to conclude that it would serve their future better to collaborate rather than compete. All jokes aside, the writing is on the wall; the PGA Tour wanted to remain tax-exempt, and end their ongoing legal matters with LIV, and by allowing LIV’s Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund (PIF) to become a “premier corporate sponsor”, the PGA Tour is still able to run independently with even more money flowing in. The PIF has faced numerous accusations of “sportswashing”, or using sports to distract from domestic/foreign controversies, especially in relation to the CIA-confirmed murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi that was orchestrated by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS). LIV may be at the forefront of sports enthusiasts regarding how the PIF has seemingly bought its major stake in international professional athletics, but the group has been slowly enticing figureheads of sports leagues all around the world.
What has gone unnoticed today beneath all of this golf talk is the fact that the PIF has now taken control of and privatized four of the top clubs in the Saudi Professional League: Al Ittihad, Al Ahli, Al Nassr and Al Hilal (Al Ahli is in the second tier of Saudi professional soccer). More than this though, while some Saudi-backed clubs in Europe like Newcastle United and Sheffield United are subjected to UEFA financial regulations, Saudi-national clubs are not. This has created a similar situation to what some may call a “brain drain” except for professional soccer players; Cristiano Ronaldo is earning £200m per year at Al Nassr, Karim Benzema is joining Al Ittihad for a £200m salary and it is rumored that Al Hilal might sign Lionel Messi for a contract that will end with a £1 billion payout for the 2022 World Cup winner. Saudi Arabia has also been aggressively pursuing their bid for the 2030 World Cup, which follows the success of Qatar’s hosting last year that many accused of as a major act of sportswashing as well. Saudi’s involvement has seeped further into the United States as well with their 10-year sponsorship of the WWE; a deal, like the PGA-LIV merger, that will be paid by an autocratic government within a country that is supposed to epitomize representative democracy. It seems as though these major financial investments by Saudi, especially within Western civilization, come with the hope that the good grace of egalitarianism that the U.S. represents will rub off on them through perception because the literal application will not happen anytime soon within a country that still regularly beheads citizens and oppresses women.
Saudi does not seem to share this sentiment though. The delusion of grandeur that they wield with their seemingly infinite supply of capital was captured by Saudi Minister of Sport Prince Abdulaziz bin Turki Al Saud who quite literally compared the country’s 81 executions of citizens in a single day to America’s mass shootings for why it is hypocritical to suggest that troubled countries cannot be global role models in the world of professional athletics. The main difference is that Prince Abdulaziz’s example of American unrest was conducted by private and unstable actors, while the Saudi death penalties were carried out by the country’s government. Prince Abdulaziz’s grand equalizer was the fact that “people died” and that it’s not fair to only look at “the bad side” of a country. If Prince Abdulaziz’s moral black hole speaks for the ethical compass of his home country, then it’s quite safe to consider ulterior motives when one of the worst professional soccer leagues in the world are giving soccer legends– who would normally retire at this point –a retirement home that they get paid to enroll in.
It’s easy to frown upon individual actors like golfers who took LIV deals before the merger or players like Ronaldo for succumbing to moral delinquency for the sake of money, but it’s hard to blame them after seeing virtuous stands by the likes of Tiger Woods or Neymar Jr. becoming worthless through their respective sports ironically growing in monetary value. I mean, how bad can it be when PIF received a golden seal of approval from the business master himself, Donald Trump, who praised it as “big, beautiful and glamorous” after having prophesied the deal in 2022. In all seriousness, as long as regimes like Saudi and Qatar continue to associate themselves with a positive connotation by touching the hearts of sports fans everywhere, sportswashing could just become sports.
